A multi-function device is an electronic device that performs a plurality of functions such as photocopying, scanning, facsimile, and printing and it performs any such functions as selected by a user. The multi-function device is an all-in-one device that is almost a necessity in office environments and is gaining popularity in home environments too. Some users/customers may wish to own their devices outright and take responsibility for maintaining and servicing such devices. On the other hand, some users lease multi-function devices and a manufacturer or a service provider takes the responsibility of maintaining these devices. In such a situation, the users may not even want to know the details about when the devices will be serviced. Further, the manufacturer may want to know fairly in advance when maintenance is necessary to minimize down time.
Typically, manufacturers configure their devices with default plans (for example, billing plans, service plans, billing impression mode etc.) during manufacturing process. For example, by default the speed plan for the printer may be 35 PPM. However, if the customers want to change their plans based on the increase or decrease usage of the devices, they generally contact customer care. Following which, a technical support person visits the customer site to perform the required configuration. Here, the configuration or re-configuration process is delayed until the technical support person arrives at the customer site and this affects the customer in terms of resource down time and cost. Therefore, there is a need for an efficient solution (in terms of time and cost) for configuring multi-function devices or such equivalent devices.